


Day Nineteen: Tobias & Tris

by claryherondale



Category: Divergent (Movies), Divergent - All Media Types, Divergent Series - Veronica Roth
Genre: Best Friends, Broken Promises, Candor Faction, Chicago, Dauntless Faction, Death, Dystopia, F/M, First Love, Friendship, Memories, No Smut, One Shot, Promises, Reminiscing, Sad, Three Years Later
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-10 20:27:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8937985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/claryherondale/pseuds/claryherondale
Summary: Day 19 of My 31 Favorite ShipsTobias and Christina visit the fallen Priors' memorial sight on the third anniversary of Tris's death.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So I posted this but I guess it didn't upload and then I added day 20 before I realized that this didn't upload. If they're out of order, that's why.
> 
> Basically this is three years post-Allegiant. Just a little bit of sad fluff(?).

Every time I hear running water, I still think of that first kiss Tris and I had. We were sitting on the rocks above the chasm, and our lips met, our bodies straining for the safety that gray clothes could have given us. Sometimes, it’s as though I catch a glimpse of her, but I know it’s just my mind playing tricks on me. They’re not completely unwelcome, however, because at least they help me to remember what she looked like. I always liked the way Tris looked. I liked the way her nose slanted and her cheekbones stood on her face. I liked her birdlike stature, short and thin. 

Dark blonde hair and blue eyes that haunt me to this day. I see them in Caleb’s face every time I pass by him in our daily lives, but they don’t quite send the same pang through me that they did right after Tris’s death.

There’s a knock on my front door, and I open it to find Christina standing on my porch. 

“You didn’t forget, did you?” she asks me. 

“No, of course not,” I say, snapping at her inadvertently.

Christina reaches a slim, brown hand out and rests it on my shoulder. I don’t brush her off, because I know she’s just trying to comfort me, and she needs the comfort, too.

“Tobias, you don’t need to lash out at me,” she says. “I’m not going to let you get away with it. That’s why I didn’t bring Caleb, Cara, or any of the others—I know they would let you speak to them however you pleased. I won’t. But I am here for you, because it has been three years since Tris died, and every anniversary—hell, every day—is just more time distancing us from a world in which she was alive.”

I raise my eyebrows. Candors never know when to shut up. But then again, the faction system has been eradicated, and even if it wasn’t, Christina passed the Dauntless initiation. Still, she has grown from that girl in a yellow dress standing before me in the Dauntless headquarters for the first time after jumping, the girl that had a smart mouth but was easily intimidated by me. She definitely isn’t apprehensive around me any longer. With Tris gone, she probably knows me the best out of everyone.

I sigh. “Let’s go, then.”

Christina flashes me a small smile, content by my response, and turns around. She descends down the front steps with her quick, long legs while I shut and lock my door. I follow her through Chicago. 

In the past three years, it has been rebuilt significantly. I recognize some faces that I pass by, but not all of them. Some of the populous left after Tris destroyed the experiment, to try to find a better life. But I know what’s out there. And it’s not a better life at all. 

We walk by Caleb and Peter, and I don’t say anything, but Christina waves. They return the gesture. I think there’s more going on between Christina and Caleb than friendship, but I haven’t asked. I don’t want to know if there is. 

I keep up with Christina’s fast tread as we walk through the city side-by-side. The sun shines over Chicago, but it isn’t exactly hot or cold. I take an uneven breath as we enclose upon what used to be the Abnegation faction. The houses have been altered—they’re no longer as dull and gray. But I remember my childhood here well. I haven’t seen Marcus since Evelyn told him to leave, and yet, some nights he still plays a role in my nightmares.

When we reach where Tris used to live with her parents and Caleb, Christina and I stop. The house has been completely remodeled—it was changed years ago. But there’s a spot in the clearing between the old Prior residence and the next house over where Christina and I made little grave markers for the three fallen members of the family. None of us knows what happened to Natalie and Andrew’s bodies, but Tris was cremated, so there are no actual remains here. But that’s not what matters. It’s the sentiment behind it.

There are just small rocks with each of their names on them in black paint, which the new owners of their old house agreed to build a little fence around and not allow anyone to deface or even touch. They—as well everyone else in Chicago—know that it’s because of Tris’s sacrifice that they are able to live in a factionless system with their memories still intact.

Every year, Christina and I plant three flowers beside the rocks in their honor. This year, we decided on globe thistles, which are just as blue as the Priors’ eyes were. The owners of their old house are also kind enough to water the flowers regularly, so that Christina and I don’t have to watch their memories die along with their bodies.

Neither Christina nor I knew Natalie and Andrew very well—Marcus was friends with Andrew when I was younger, but I don’t remember much of that. Regardless, Tris would have wanted her parents to be honored alongside her. 

When Christina gets done planting Andrew’s flower, before she starts on Natalie’s and while I’m working on enclosing the dirt around Tris’s, she sits back momentarily and says, “You know that Tris would want you to move on, right? I know it felt like longer, but you only dated for a few months. She was your first love, and she had a profound impact upon all of our lives, but you were only eighteen then, and even now, you’re a measly twenty-one years old. You were first loves. But that doesn’t mean she has to be your last love—it doesn’t even mean that she would have been if she had survived. My point is, you haven’t dated anyone since she died. And she wouldn’t want that for you.”

I stare at my dirty hands in front of me and eventually respond, “I know. It’s just difficult finding anyone who even compares to her.”

“No one is ever going to compare to Tris,” says Christina with a small smile.

We finish packing the earth down around the flowers before I say, “I lied to her once.”

“About what?” Christina asks.

“I told her—when I got myself locked up in Erudite headquarters with her—‘you die, I die too’. But here we are. She’s been dead for three years, and I’m still alive.”

“I can promise you that she would not have wanted you to die along with her,” Christina says. “Tobias, you are my best friend in this world. I would never lie to you.”

“Still sounding like a Candor.”

She laughs and playfully hits my shoulder, and then stands up and turns to leave. For a moment, I look at the rock that reads, ‘Beatrice Prior’. I kiss the tip of two of my fingers and press them to the cold stone with timid pressure. Although she cannot respond, I know what she would say to me right now: “I love you too, Tobias.”

I get back up and jog to catch up to Christina, with the promise that I will return every year on this day for the rest of my life.

**Author's Note:**

> Well I already posted Day 20, but 
> 
> Hint for tomorrow's (today's) ship:  
> sizzle sizzle


End file.
